Attending:

Reports

Marketing

Katerina Frost blogging to raise our social media profile
Cell phone donations 1000 used, 500 new, expecting 200-300 more
Cell phones (used) for seniors, but also now for victims of domestic violence
Free geek sticker on every phone that goes out
Parks board commissioner sarah blythe
Recycling project around strathcona area Feb 12-14
Concerned about sales – wanting to have a better tally of units recycled vs sold
Recycled materials equivalent weight of 2 busses
Bit coin festival – cricket to attend
Earth day in the spring – what are we doing for that?
Geek day?
Need more volunteers
Advertise on craigslist
Interesting to see how ride to conquer cancer advertises for volunteers
Free Geek profile a chief concern
Vancouver Giants interested in promotion opportunity
Cricket has a little map to use as a model for circulating to get our profile out there
Looking to get some income from grants this year

Recycling

Let go of 2 recycling vendors because they were too expensive
Now have 2 new ones – better relationship
There exists a list of all of our current vendors – needs to be updated
New racking
New pallet lift to be acquired

Volunteers

Concerns about effectiveness of dismantle instruction board
Positioned behind the volunteers
Instructions might be too complicated
Looking to simplify processes – look at assembly-line-ifing
Need safety glasses, and looking for a good source – maybe Midland
Gloves comes from local Watson
Cricket starting a binder to collect ideas and suggestions from volunteers

Health and Safety

Netting installed between upper level of warehouse racking and dismantle bench to prevent things from falling off the racking onto volunteers
Equipment inadvertently piled up in front of the first aid cabinet creating a serious risk – area in front of cabinet should be clear at all times – concerns addressed recently with staff
Concern also expressed about volunteer safety at the dismantle bench
Things piling up quite high around the bench area, posing risk for volunteers
Neither Michael nor Adrian (while working at their desks) have a clear view of the volunteers at the dismantle bench bringing up concerns about adequate supervision of safe working practices (though it was acknowledged that staff are often out of their desks with an eye on this). Discussed value and possibilities to improve lines of sight
Discussed protocol for addressing safety concerns
There are a number of concerns about the upkeep of the facility (tidiness)
Practice has generally been for people to bring concerns to one of the staff based either on their availability or the scope of their responsibility
Realizing that this may not be comfortable or effective in every case, we discussed the possibility of taking concerns directly to a staff representative from the Health and Safety Committee with the understanding that they would work with the rest of the staff as necessary to see that issues are resolved
One point of clarification – it is not within the Boards role to direct work at Free Geek; it is however, one of the chief responsibilities of the Board to make sure that the organization is achieving its goals and doing so in a safe and responsible way. In this way, it is part of the Board’s role to point out safety concerns and see that they are addressed.

Move Committee

Full out move not realistic until profile gets increased
Split might be hard to manage right now
Must have a sound understanding of our financials before we commit to any move
Cricket to talk to a realtor to determine what market options are – will direct to Mac

Servers

To be moved on Sunday

Involvement with Surrey Public Library

Vanlog, Ubuntu Vancouver, Surrey Public Library host open help night 3rd Thurs of the month
Might be good model for remote / satellite work

Education / Classroom

Portland has really developed their ed program
Dedicated board person
Dedicated classroom space
Range of classes offered
Revenue generation potential
Could possibly use the cave
Would require some effort to secure the laptop area – at the outset someone to stay and monitor the area
Brian suggests a table configuration that would make it multi use
Three levels of instruction
Brian already knows some people interested in instructing
Actionable tasks / commits?
Curriculum for starter course for end of February
Education intern coordinator

HR

Priority to get the Job Description review process going again
For some positions, roles and priorities are unclear right now
Specific concerns related to
Shipping receiving good receipt, billing, invoicing
Build metrics and currently low desktop numbers